Poetry
by sad little tiger
Summary: Piers struggles with his recovery and discovers who he really is. Post-RE6. AU. Piers/Chris.
1. Chapter 1

_Some say the world will end in fire,_

 _Some say in ice._

 _From what I've tasted of desire_

 _I hold with those who favor fire._

 _But if it had to perish twice,_

 _I think I know enough of hate_

 _To say that for destruction ice_

 _Is also great_

 _And would suffice._

\- Robert Frost

* * *

 _"_ _Hey."_

Muted beeps. Cold, dry air. The tightness of tape on the skin of his arms, the burn of needles jammed in every vein.

He breathed - a deep, pained exhale through his nose. His right eye cracked open at the familiar voice; the reconstructed lid still a raw pink. He winced, his hips moving. One knee was drawn to the side, his foot kicked out in discomfort and his left hand balled up in the stiff, sterile sheets. His jaw clenched and then relaxed as best it could with the wires holding it shut. He swallowed, and his throat was on fire.

He was lucky though, right?

After all, he was alive.

 _Is_ alive.

... was alive.

Chris fought through his own tears. "Hey kid," he tried again, his voice cracking. "So... they say you're gonna be okay."

He dragged in another ragged breath, his nostrils flaring, and then he closed his eye again, sore brow furrowing. Great swaths of flesh down his right flank were still flayed open. Wet gauze laid over the parts of his body that had been grafted. Chris took in all of it - the lacerations and the gouges where the surgeon's vulture scalpels had carved out the havoc the virus had wreaked on him, the arm that was slowly rebuilding itself through stem cell therapy, the agonized writhing...

Chris looked up at the wretched hard fluorescents. He felt for Piers' good hand and held it. "You'll be alright, kid."

* * *

He came every day to see him.

He was the _only_ person who came to see Piers.

The knock startled him. He craned his neck, his head tilted at a strange angle, the skin on his throat still new and stiff. He held his place in the book on his lap - _New Hampshire_.

"What's that?" Chris asked. He took up nearly the entire doorway, backlit by the ugly white light of the hospital hallway. It was a picture out of a comic book - the triumphant, invincible hero visiting his poor, mortal sidekick. Piers looked up, and then away shamefully, trying to turn his face to the into shadows of his room.

"Captain," he said. The reverence was still there, hiding in his weak voice.

He listened to Chris's footsteps, growing closer, until he felt Chris lifting the book from his hand. He studied the cover and frowned, dogearred the page Piers had been on, and then began leafing through the poetry collection.

Piers watched him read, slowly slipping his mangled arm under the thin blanket. He tried desperately to hide all that was wrong with him. He couldn't bear the thought... Chris seeing him... like a monster. It made him nauseous.

"You got a favorite?" He asked.

Piers glanced at him, his gaze meeting Chris's and then averting shyly. "Yeah."

Chris pursed his lips, has eyes skimming over one page, flipping to the next. He waited a beat. "Which one?"

Piers arched his back to ease the pain that had settled low on his spine. He gently took the book back from Chris. He searched the index and found it, pointed to it. Chris nodded as he read the title.

" _Fire and Ice_ , huh?"

Piers stared at his lips, the way they mouthed the words. Chris read slowly, haltingly. He came to final line and hesitated on the last word, the beginnings of it forming on his tongue, pressed to the back of his teeth. He didn't know the word. Piers saw all of it.

"Suffice," he said. Chris looked up then. Their eyes met. "That word - it's _suffice_."

"Yeah," Chris agreed. He cleared his throat, uncomfortably. "Which uh... which one do you agree with?"

"I dunno. Maybe... both?" Chris listened. "You know... I've been through both. I think, for me, it's a really personal notion, right? Like maybe it isn't about the end of the world... but about your own death. Spiritually, emotionally, physically, I guess. And that part about perishing twice... You know, we all die a few times in our lives, don't we? It's just a matter of how we come back from it." He watched Chris's expression for recognition, for response.

Chris narrowed his eyes. He didn't reply.

Piers looked away again, feeling hot blood rushing to his ears, knowing well they were pink with embarrassment. That _always_ happened. He cursed himself. Why would he say all of that... to Chris Redfield, no less? His goddamn captain. What the hell had he even said? How could he be so... stupid?

"How are you gonna come back?" Chris asked softly.

Piers held his breath and begged his thundering heart to stop it's horrible pounding. Eventually, he just shrugged. He had no answers for his captain.

Chris clasped his hands in front of him, his elbows resting on his knees. He hung his head. "It's not the end for you."

Piers snorted. "Right..."

"It's not. Really. There's other callings out there. There's other causes that need you," he said.

"They fired me."

Chris sat back, his mouth opening and then closing as he tried to think of what to say. "Oh... they didn't _fire_ you, Piers, they -"

"They gave me a fucking medal and a flag... And they told me I was discharged..." He looked up, grimacing. It ached so much, especially as he said it aloud to _this_ man... this _savior_.

"Piers, it was honorable. You were... you were maimed in the line of duty... They didn't... They'll take care of you," he whispered.

Piers shook his head sadly.

"They will," Chris argued. "You're a hero." He smiled, even laughed a bit at the end. His hand was warm on Piers's shoulder. He rubbed - almost tenderly, and his callused fingers strayed up to the nape of his neck. He shook him playfully then, until Piers had no choice but to look at him. Chris smiled again. "You're a hero, kid. A fuckin' Purple Heart-wearing, card-carrying, honorably-discharged, ass-kicking hero."

Piers looked away, blinking back bitter tears of disappointment.

But Chris's hand remained there, on the back of his neck, one of his fingers in his hair. It burned. It kept his heart racing. It... was wrong.

It was right.

And suddenly, it was gone. Piers inhaled sharply at the loss.

"They're letting you outta here soon, right?" Chris leaned back in the plastic chair, two legs off the ground.

"Yeah. A few days." He closed the book and held it with his good hand, the other hidden again beneath the covers. Out of sight, where it belonged.

"Gonna stay with family or... girlfriend or something?"

Piers sighed. "Nah."

"Why not?"

"I'm not... I'm not close with my parents." Piers paused. "And my ex-wife doesn't want shit to do with me."

Chris pretended to adjust the sleeve of his own t-shirt. "Fine by you, right?"

Piers almost cracked a smile. "Yeah. I guess so."

"I'm heading out soon."

Piers nodded, staring at the cover of _New Hampshire_. He traced the letters of Robert Frost's embossed name with his fingers. "It's late. You oughta head home now. Before it gets dark." He immediately cringed. How lame. _Before it gets dark._ Like the captain was a school girl.

He hoped that the reason for all this verbal stumbling was the pain meds. It was humiliating.

"I don't mean tonight. I mean... I'm leaving. Bought some property a while ago. West Virginia," Chris said.

Piers frowned. He tried - he really _had_ tried to stop the expression before it surfaced. But it was so overpowering... "Oh," was all he could manage.

Chris picked at the hem of the bed sheet then. "Yeah. Fixer-upper. Needs a fuckin' ton of work. Gonna be rough for a while." He looked up and then off. He was lost, imagining something. He made a big gesture with his hand. "So much land though... acres and acres up there in the mountains. Hills and trees and grass. Looks like the sun sets right there... Right in the front yard. Prettiest thing I've ever seen..."

Piers went there with him, to that piece of heaven on earth. Chris was a lot of things, but an exaggerator wasn't one of them. And if he said it was the most beautiful place in the world... it had to be the most beautiful place in world.

"Can't wait to get started, ya know? Get my hands dirty."

Piers tried to smile, his eyes downcast, his fingers still playing with the book - pinching the edge, slipping under the library's plastic jacket.

"I could use some help," Chris said quietly. "If you don't have anything goin' on. I mean... I'm sure you got plans for when you get out."

And as quickly as it had been stalled, Piers's heart swelled, almost to bursting. He didn't... couldn't speak. He just stared up as Chris stood to leave.

He stood silhouetted in the doorway again - the consummate hero.

"Think about it, kid." He looked back as left. "See you tomorrow."

Piers listened to the nurses chatting animatedly at the desk in the hall. He listened to his roommate snoring in the bed that was separated from his by a curtain with a flower print.

He listened to his heart for the first time in his life.


	2. Chapter 2

_A Man may make a Remark._

 _In itself - a quiet thing_

 _That may furnish the Fuse unto a Spark_

 _In dormant nature - lain._

 _Let us divide - with skill -_

 _Let us discourse - with care_

 _Powder exists in Charcoal_

 _Before it exists in Fire._

"A Man may make a Remark" - Emily Dickinson

* * *

 **September, 2013.**

The drive took about a day from D.C. They didn't talk much on the way down. They didn't need to. Chris turned up Lynyrd Skynyrd and Stone Temple Pilots and Velvet Revolver and sang along. Sometimes Piers knew the song... other times, it was a relic from a time before his twenty-four years.

Chris drove a 1995 Jeep Wrangler. He'd taken everything off but the roll bars. It handled poorly, and the gears were creaky when they shifted, the second missing entirely; the cloth seats were torn and the warm air blowing back on their faces smelled like burning transmission fluid. Piers liked it. It made him feel whole. He'd left his own dull little import with a neighbor and made no plans to pick it up.

In the backseat, Chris's old retriever laid on their bags and barked at every stop light. Sometimes, Chris's elusive sense of humor cracked through his stony facade - the dog's name, for instance, was Romero. Piers would have smiled at that, but smiling hurt his mouth. So he didn't.

The dog jumped all over them at rest stops and raced across the open greens like it had all of it's life to live.

"Gonna suck when I gotta put him down," Chris said as they stood, leaning against the Jeep. He jammed his hands in the pockets of his ripped jeans and squinted, watching as Romero chased a squirrel. It chirped at him from the trunk of a big tree, it's tail whipping.

Piers glanced at him. "Toughest ride you'll ever take." He screwed and unscrewed a bottle of Cherry Coke, over and over. Chris's shoulder brushed against his. Piers stepped away, just a bit. He hoped Chris wouldn't notice.

"Kinda disgusting of me," Chris said suddenly.

"Hmm?" The cherry Coke swished back and forth.

"It's disgusting… that I can mow down a hundred men… have a good night's sleep. But the thought of my dog… I just…" He didn't finish.

Next to them, a young family in a sedan pulled up. A little girl jumped out of the back, her baby brother struggling in his carseat. Chris nodded to her as she skipped past, running up the sidewalk to the vending machines.

He turned and found Piers bent over the hood of the Jeep, pretending to be studying something intently. He looked at Chris, and then away - shamed again. Chris frowned in the sunlight.

"It's not that bad, Piers," he said.

"I'm a fucking monster." He ground it out between clenched teeth, _spit_ it out so that he could feel the burn of each word. "Look at me, Captain."

Chris shook his head in disagreement, but his eyes stayed on his scuffed Nikes.

"Look at me, goddammit," he hissed.

Chris's jaw set.

They stared at each other. Piers's left eye was now forever an eerie pearl, it's pupil contracted to a reptilian slit in the glare of the sunlight; his face was a map of pink scar tissue - gouged out and stapled back together like the doctors had been playing with a doll. It wasn't their fault, really... they'd had so much to reconstruct... so little left to work with.

Romero bounded up then and scrambled into the backseat.

"You gotta take a leak or anything?" Chris asked, keys in his hand.

"I just did. You were there," Piers answered, his tone short.

"You wanna drive?" Chris tried again.

"No." He opened the passenger side door and pulled his sweatshirt hood all the way up.

It was hard to drive when you were hiding your face.

* * *

"You want anything?" He pushed the cranky gear shift into _park_.

Piers sank low in the passenger seat. They'd pulled off the county road to stop at an old convenient store when Chris had announced they were "close to home". It was a lopsided little building with one gas pump and five pick-ups parked out front.

Exactly the bumfuck kind of place you'd expect to get hassled at when your face looked like it had gone a few rounds with a pit bull.

Chris waited for him to respond... but he just sulked. "Alright. Well, I'm gonna run in. I don't have anything to eat up at the house."

Piers licked his lips. "What? Don't want me to go in with you?" He didn't meet Chris's surprised face, but he imagined it as he stared at the dashboard.

"Piers... That's not what -" Chris started.

"No. It's fine, sir. I wouldn't wanna be seen with me either." Piers waved his bad hand, still half-formed. It might be that way for the rest of his life - the stem cell specialists and the genetic scientists and the plastic surgeons and the million doctors didn't know, couldn't say. They considered it a _success_ though - his claw-hand and his useless arm. A _medical triumph_ , they called it. A _break-through_ , they said.

It all made Piers wonder what a _failure_ might look like to them.

Chris grabbed him by his shirt collar then, wrenched him almost from the passenger seat. Piers gasped - everything moving too fast for a reaction. Chris brought him inches from his face.

"I'm gettin' sick of this passive-aggressive pity party bullshit," he growled. "You wanna sit here and feel sorry for yourself, go ahead. Don't pull that with me though. Now either you get the fuck out of this Jeep and walk your dusty ass in that store with me, or you shut the hell up." Chris breathed. "I'm not gonna beg you to be a man." He paused. "You didn't beg me, did you?"

He shoved Piers away then, shoved him back into his seat. They stared at each other, on fire with their anger - Chris at Piers, Piers at everything.

Furious, he reached into the backseat and snatched up his BSAA ball cap. He tugged the brim down over his eyes, his jaw clenching and unclenching all the while. He slid out of the seat and stomped up to the store.

Chris watched him. And smiled.

* * *

The rednecks stood around the counter, their red and black plaid shirts dirty with mud. One of them had a shotgun slung over his shoulder as they talked with the clerk at the register. Piers kept his head down and started up the food aisle.

"I'm tellin' you, Kerry, that buck hada be one-fifty. Biggest sumobitch I seen in years," the tallest one said.

Piers listened as he browsed cans of soup and beans and vegetables. He picked up a homemade jar of pickled okra.

"Sure it was, boss," the guy behind the counter laughed. Tall Tale grumbled and the rest of the group chuckled at whatever he'd said, their feet shuffling on the cheap linoleum floor. They were quiet then - no doubt watching him. Piers yanked on his hat, his shoulders up to his ears. He tried very hard to disappear.

The bell at the top of the door jingled again as Chris walked in. The men at the counter nodded to him, and he raised a hand in greeting. He joined Piers with a basket.

"You hear Jen's in a family way again?" The one with the shotgun asked. A few grunts of disapproval went up.

"I dunno what went wrong with that girl. Her ma must be rollin' in her grave," Tall Tale added. "Who's the daddy this time?"

"Heard it was Tommy Junior," the clerk stopped to spit in a bowl behind the counter. "O'er there on Johnny Cake Ridge. You know the one."

Chris knocked half the shelf into the basket - Cambell's chicken noodle soup, canned corn, peaches in syrup, a suspiciously packaged bag of Eight O'Clock coffee. He tossed a loaf of white bread in too. Piers looked at the expiration date skeptically. Chris had a stomach of steel - his ability to eat anything was legendary in their troop.

He didn't fair much better at the rattling cooler in the back of the store. He chose his drinks indiscriminately - a twelve-pack of Coke, a gallon of artificially-flavored fruit punch, some non-dairy creamer.

"You want anything else?" Chris asked. Piers looked up at him and then away. He shook his head. The locals had fallen quiet again, watching the two of them with more interest than was comfortable. He followed Chris up to check out, his hands hidden in the hoodie, his eyes downcast, his heart pounding.

The hunting buddies stepped aside for them, but only enough so that they could dump their things on the counter. They hovered disconcertingly close, and Piers was conscious of every breath, every second that passed. Chris ignored them and emptied the basket while the rednecks judgmentally looked over everything they'd picked up. Piers stared at Chris's back and tried to swallow - he found he couldn't. It was as if his throat had closed in on itself.

The clerk spit again and began hen-pecking each item into the register.

"You boys ain't from round here. Where ya headed?" Tall Tale asked, his arms crossed. He looked down at them - which was no small feat as Chris measured in at a little over six feet.

"Just bought a house - up on Northman," Chris replied without even honoring Tall Tale with a glance.

"Eric's old cabin, huh?" Shotgun cut in.

"That's the one," Chris said, nodding.

"Place is a wreck, in't it?" The clerk searched a can of beef stew for the hand-written price tag.

"Yeah. Yeah, it is." Chris rubbed his face, exhausted by the thought of it.

"There's a True Value up on Compton Road. Ol' Roy closes shop on Sundays though," the younger man in a lumberjack hat told them. He kept staring at Piers's face, thoughtful and hard.

"Thanks. We'll check it out." Chris smiled weakly and pulled his wallet from his back pocket.

"Twenty-four big ones." The clerk started bagging the food. Piers tried to swallow again.

Chris leafed through the bills, pulling out three tens. Tall Tales glared at him, tilting his head to better see the I.D. tucked beneath a plastic pocket.

"You military?" He asked.

Chris sighed. He handed the cash over. "B.S.A.A."

"B.S.A.A.?" Shotgun perked up. "You them boys over in China, right?"

Chris shrugged, like it was no big deal.

"You seen combat?" The beer-guzzling overweight stereotype of the group asked.

"Got back a coupla months ago," Chris waited for his change and Piers gathered up their grocery bags. He frowned at the one that was ripping.

"Lemme git you another one, boy," the clerk said. "Here - hold it out." He doubled the bag and handed it back. Piers glanced up, meeting the clerk's gaze and mouthed a thank-you.

"That happen to you in the line?" Tall Tale asked.

Piers nodded.

"Holy shit, son," Shotgun shouldered the weapon on his other arm, stared incredulously at his scars.

"Kid's a hero," Chris said then, his voice low. "Saved my life. Saved alotta lives out there."

"No kiddin'... fuck," Sidekick Stereotype said. He adjusted his hat and then thought better of it - taking it off completely.

Following suit, the rest of the men - even the clerk - took off their hats.

Piers felt his face flushing. He looked down and waited for Chris.

Someone thumped him on the back, appreciative. "You boys need anything - help cleanin' that shithole up... a beer... whatever... come on down here and ask, ya hear?" Tall Tales said.

"Thanks." Chris shook hands with him then. "We'll be around."

* * *

"Wasn't so bad, was it?" He asked as the Jeep struggled. The incline of the road was hard on the Old Dog and Chris worked it gently, plying the engine with soft shifts.

Piers shook his head.

"Bet you could catch more than a few pretty girls with your story," Chris teased. "Ladies love a wounded soldier... Nothin' drops panties faster."

Piers pulled off the ballcap and ran his fingers through his hair. "I'm good. Been so long... I dunno if I'd even know what to do with a girl now."

Chris looked over at him and then back to the road. "You said you got an ex-wife?"

Piers laughed - a burst. "Yeah."

Chris gestured for more. "... And?"

"And... we got married when she was eighteen... I was nineteen... Divorced two years ago." He hung onto the roll bar.

"What happened?" Chris pried.

Piers cleared his throat. "Well... she met this guy at school... Out-grew me, I guess."

Chris nodded and then he left it alone.

* * *

"So... am I right... or am I right?"

The pinks and yellows of the mountain sunset dripped down between the broad leaves and ancient trunks of oaks and black walnuts. Around the little cabin, the overgrown property sprouted thick bouquets of purple musk thistle flowers.

The house itself grew up like a weed on a little mound in the middle of a clearing. Chris had only mentioned the ten acres, mostly a steep run-off into the wooded valley below. The sun bled out over the grass and trees and all of it truly took on the appearance of some earthly paradise - everything gilded gold, red, and orange as far as the eye could see.

Piers smiled, but the skin around his mouth tugged unnaturally and so he stopped. "It's real pretty, sir."

"Call me that again... I'll knock you on your ass," Chris replied. He hefted a few of their bags over a shoulder and started up through the knee-high grass to the cabin. Romero ran excited circles around the Jeep and then down the unpaved driveway and then it was silent, except for the crunch of gravel under his boots.

Piers looked up. A copper-yellow leaf fell from the top of an oak, a slow-motion descent to the ground.

It felt like home.

* * *

The nights in the mountains were dark. There was no light - only sad blinking stars and rolling gray clouds, heavy with fall rain. The air was so clear and cold that it almost hurt to breathe. Chris had told him so. And he was right.

On the porch, Piers listened to the hooting of an owl and stared off into the pitch black. He pulled the flannel blanket tight across his shoulders and let his head rest on the back of the rickety bench swing. The chain links, rusted and worn, squealed with each pass he made - one of his bare feet pushing off the floorboards lazily.

He closed his eyes and the owl called deep into the night.

The screen door creaked open and Chris stepped out. Piers sat up, wincing.

Chris took a swig from a can and rubbed his nose. He stared off at the shadows of mountains. "What do you think?"

Piers smiled in the dark. "I like it."

"Needs a lot of love."

"Yeah."

"Gonna take time. And work. Blood, sweat, tears. All that. It'll be worth it though... It'll heal."

"It will."

"You're up for it?"

Piers hesitated. He realized they might not be talking about the house anymore.

Chris walked to the edge of the porch, his hand on the railing of the rotting steps. He ran careful fingers over the aged wood - loving, gentle. Piers could almost feel them on his own skin. "We can do this, kid... We'll do this together."


	3. Chapter 3

_Live blindly and upon the hour. The Lord,_

 _Who was the Future, died full long ago._

 _Knowledge which is the Past is folly. Go,_

 _Poor, child, and be not to thyself abhorred._

 _\- "Live Blindly Upon the Hour", Trumbull Stickney_

* * *

 _September, 2013._

Piers woke up to a rustle and then a clang in the kitchen. Something dropping in the metal tub sink. Sunlight blazed through the window above his head and dust floated in and out of the rays as they fell to the floor. He listened to the racket continue, scratched his shoulder and turned over, yanking the blanket up over himself. There was a scrubbing then - hard and with a wire brush, from the grating sound of it.

He lazily opened his cat's eye and checked his watch in the pink light under the covers.

 _7:32._

It was very early for Chris.

 _Well, good for him. Bull by the horns and all that._

He snuggled into the rickety mattress. It was musty and old… God only knew what kind of crazy, backwoods shit it had seen… But there weren't any mites in it as far as he could tell, and the springs hadn't really torn through the fabric _yet_ , and it was a lot better than what he'd gotten used to on assignment. Piers mused, half-asleep, on the filthiest hole-in-the-wall he and Chris were forced to call base in Edonia. It couldn't have been more than twenty feet by —

"This place is a fuckin' mess…"

Piers sat straight up and tossed the flannel blanket off.

That… _that_ was definitely a _woman's_ voice.

He frantically searched the floor next to the bed, his malformed hand feeling for his shirt. Piers cursed under his breath - it was a clumsy limb, the nerve damage still too severe to really do much else but hang there like some hunk of dead, useless flesh. He found his jeans and picked them up with his good arm; his handgun clattered to the hardwood and then skipped under the bed frame. He ignored it and forced himself into the worn-out legs, struggling with his damned hand again when he reached the zipper.

Piers stood, hissing - his warm bare feet shocked by the cold floor. He found his shirt on the other side of the bed, inside out and reeking of day-old cologne. He pulled it over his head, careful of the surgical staples, still holding his side together.

The bedroom door was ajar, and he peered out, through the open space of the living room to the sad little kitchen. She was there, hunched over the sink, scrubbing furiously. She had on garish rubber gloves, all the way up to her elbows, and she was mumbling. He watched her push a few strands of chestnut hair from her eyes - the rest of it was pulled back in loose ponytail that swayed with every move she made. She rubbed her cheek with the back of her wrist and went back to work, the smell of her orange cleaner wafting toward Piers.

And suddenly, as if she knew she was being spied on, she turned to him.

Their eyes met… and they both gasped. She was unconventionally beautiful - the bridge of her nose perfectly flawed, set between enormous cornflower blue eyes… and her mouth - almost obscenely full…

And she had just stared at him, in all of his deformity and grotesqueness. _Speechless._

Piers slammed the door and leaned on it. He cringed and then held his breath - listening. She took her time. Gave it a good minute or two before she dared to knock softly.

He fought the rising panic that bubbled up from his stomach. She had looked him in the face; she'd seen what a monster was. The first woman to lay eyes on him since his stay at the hospital. And she was so angelically pretty… He had no idea who she was - maybe a girlfriend Chris hadn't mentioned? He'd never asked - stupid, stupid, _stupid!_ He hated Chris at that moment… _Why the hell hadn't he said he was having company?_

Slowly, he turned the knob, heard the click as the door fell ajar again. He left it there and backed away from it, hid behind it.

Her fingers were first, now without the awful yellow gloves. He stared at them, curled around the edge of the door. And then the rest of her emerged - carefully, quietly. Like a deer. He lowered his gaze to the floor, to her feet. He swallowed, hard.

She didn't seem to mind how suspicious and ugly he must have looked at that moment. She approached him and he stole glances at her. She was so calm, and she smelled like the sweetest, mildest vanilla.

"Oh, hunny…," she whispered. Without hesitation, she touched his face. The _worst_ side.

Piers jerked away from her, wounded, and they looked into each other's eyes for the second time. "I'm sorry," he said, and he didn't know if he was apologizing for pulling back… or for existing in his mangled body.

"It's okay." She took his sickly hand, and brought it up - all the way to her chest.

He was horrified - shocked by her boldness, and he turned his head. It was too much. Bad enough that this strange woman was in Chris's house… but now she'd trapped him, and she'd touched the most wretched parts of him, and was making him touch her. He hadn't touched a woman in two years. He hadn't been this _intimate_ with anyone in much longer…

She ran the backs of his half-formed fingers over her chest, just below the perfect fiddle of her collar bone, and then he sighed - all of the anguish just melted away. He hadn't even noticed the mess of raised tissue there. He watched her out of the corner of his eye; he took in the angry puckered, pink scars; a lovely, terrifying star, right there on her porcelain skin. The brand of something horrible that she'd endured.

He wanted to ask her what or who had done that to her… but he couldn't speak.

"It's okay," she repeated, soft. She reached out again, a feather-light touch just above his pearl eye, followed the jigsaw puzzle that striped his cheek and cut down around his mouth.

The strangest thing happened to him then: an agonizing pressure built up behind his nose, and his nostrils flared, and his mouth frowned, and he couldn't help himself.

He began to cry.

She stroked his face, even through his pathetic tears. He saw how her own eyes welled up. "You're in so much pain," she said. "He didn't tell me how bad you're hurting… I'm sorry… I'm so sorry…"

Her words made him weep and his shoulders racked with the sobs that came on too fiercely to hold back. She kept her hand over his, on her chest, and she closed the space between them, her fingers buried in the hair at the nape of his neck. She pressed herself against him and he felt like she was… _taking_ some of it - his torment and misery.

This stranger… this woman he'd never seen before, was shouldering his burden.

And the front door opened. Piers backed up at the sound, shied away from her touch and turned. She watched him as he used the collar of his shirt to wipe his face.

"Hello?" Chris called from the living room. They could hear Romero; his claws clicked on the wood as he ran back and forth excitedly. Chris's tennis shoes dropped to the floor, one at time. "Hey!"

"We're here," she said then. She touched Piers's shoulder and whispered, "Him? You're embarrassed in front of _him_? He cries at anything with Julia Roberts in it..."

Piers snorted and smiled at that, still wiping under his eyes. He looked at her in the morning light and she held his good hand. She beamed at him, squeezed his fingers gently.

"Met my girl, huh?" Chris watched them from the doorway. He leaned on the frame, rested his head there. Piers let go of her and cleared his throat.

"I was telling him how you cry at every Julia Roberts movie," she taunted. She turned to Piers. "Every single one."

"Now Jill...," Chris defended himself. "Tell the boy the truth..." She sauntered over to him and cuddled up to his side. He crossed his arms and looked down at her. He raised an eyebrow.

Piers though, was still reeling from the mention of her name. _Jill._ He stared at them incredulously.

 _Jill._

"Remember what happened when you saw _Steel Magnolias_ , Chris? Way back in Raccoon, at that dollar theater?" She winked at Piers. "Why don't you tell him about that one, Redfield?" She played, tugging on his bicep. He relented, his eyes narrowing, a smile starting at the corners of his too-serious lips...

 _Jill Valentine._

"Are you Jill Valentine?" Piers blurted.

She stopped her flirting, and so did Chris. They looked at him. Chris sighed.

"Technically... no," he said.

"Technically?" Piers sputtered. "Wh-what the hell does that mean - _technically_?"

"Jill Valentine died. At the Spencer Estate," she added in a chipper tone.

Piers looked horrified.

The three of them were at a standstill. Chris caved first.

"She didn't die. She was uh... she came back with me. From Africa." He was avoiding something. Piers stared at him, too struck dumb by the revelation to dig anymore. Jill Valentine had been deceased since 2006... She was hailed as the B.S.A.A.'s greatest hero, an idol, Chris's queen... But she was dead... _Dead_.

"It doesn't matter," Jill said, saving them the awkward conversation. "I'm Audrey Cutter now... But you can call me Jill." She held out of her hand to Piers. He shook it, stunned.

"Not in public. She's not Jill in public, got it?" Chris said.

She made a surly face, mocking him.

Piers smiled. "Affirmative, Captain."

* * *

Jill ran her hand over the dry wall. She frowned at the bumps. Piers watched - it was her right hand... long, capable fingers and swollen joints - a fellow knuckle-cracker. He might never see his own right hand again.

She turned. "Well, at least it's not papered, right?" She tried very hard to make their job sound more bearable.

He nodded. He'd been mostly silent since Chris had left again - relegated to grocery duty. The closest Giant Eagle was off the interstate, a good hour drive each way... God only knew how long he'd stumble through Jill's extensive list once he got there. Piers had been watching the clock though. He was nervous and jumpy. It wasn't because of _her_ , per say. She might have been anyone. He found himself turning unnaturally, to be sure she was always on his better side, no matter how awkward the position.

"You look like him," she said suddenly.

Piers swallowed. "Who?" His voice was soft and husky.

"Chris." She crouched and wedged the claw of a hummer under the paint can lid. Methodically, she wedged, pulled, and turned. Wedge, pull, turn. All the way around, until the disc popped off and she laid it gently on the newspaper they'd spread on the floor. "Will you run that tape? Up there? Around the edge, yeah?"

He realized he'd been staring. "Yes. Of course. Sorry."

"Stop saying that. You do, though. You look like him - when he was just a kid. It's uncanny." She surveyed Piers as he worked up on the step stool, using his good hand to run out the length of blue tape, the bad to hold it down as he tore it off.

Piers smiled broadly and ignored the scar tissue tugging his cheek. "S'that a good thing, I hope?" He flattened the paint tape with his fingers.

"Oh yeah." Her hands were on her hips. There was a laugh in her voice. "He thought he was somethin' else altogether."

"He wasn't?" Piers humored her.

She bent over the paint can, swirled it with a balsam wood stick. "No, he was... He says you two are cut from the same cloth."

Piers stopped, the tape only half-way across the seam of ceiling and wall.

"I can see it." She stirred, the paint spiraling fresh cream and eggshell white. "How's he been?"

Piers shrugged. "Okay, I think. Better."

Jill hefted the paint can up by the wire handle. She began to pour it in a tray on the drop-clothed kitchen table. "That's good... I was worried. He wouldn't take my calls... you know, when he was over there."

Piers listened. He eased himself down to his knees, wincing. His side ached at that.

"Hunny, don't do it. I'll get the base boards. Just leave 'em."

He sniffled in the cold room and stood again. "I'm sorry. I can't... It's really hard to do with my staples and -"

She waved him away, took the tape. "Don't. You're fine."

He worked the paint into a roller. She taped along the base boards. When she was finished with the perimeter of two walls, she turned to him and said, "I blame myself for everything... with him."

"With Chris? Why?" He kept going back and forth through the paint, watching it draw the fibers to points all over the roller. He knew her eyes were on him. He'd calmed down a bit, but it still made him twitchy - the idea of someone getting a good enough look to memorize the mess his face had become.

"Because I said no when he asked me to marry him. And then he went back in... and then that shit in Edonia. He went missing." She picked at her nails. "I thought... I thought of maybe flying over there, finding him, draggin' him back home, you know?"

Piers looked at her. He hadn't known Chris had proposed to anyone. He hadn't known that Jill Valentine was alive and well in the United States. He realized he hadn't known _anything_ about Chris really.

It hurt.

Today hurt a lot.

"But I didn't," she continued. "Because I was scared. I just kept calling his cell phone... and hoping maybe he'd pick up."

Piers touched the roller to the wall, felt the pillow-ness of it collapse under the pressure. He'd always liked painting but he'd never had the chance to do it much growing up. His parents were renters and they moved from one shitty apartment to the next through his childhood. "It wasn't just you. He didn't pick up for anyone. I spent six months over there, lookin' for him." Piers watched the roller spatter his arm. "It wasn't your fault."

She unwrapped a little paint brush, the bristles angled for edges.

"Can I... can I ask you what happened? When you didn't die?" He was hesitant, shy.

Jill laughed. It was such a bizarre-sounding question. Piers felt the clearer side of his face flush.

"Well, let's see. I fell with Wesker - you knew that much, right? And then he kept me alive in a tube for a year, or so I'm told. After that... he woke me up, took me to Africa, and made me his lapdog with some kind of drug." She paused, looking up. "Cue Chris, who isn't anything like me, by the way. He actually _bothered_. He rescued me." She sighed. "When we got back here, to the States, they gave me two choices: keep my identity and be charged with war crimes... or stay dead and go into the WPP."

Piers stared at the wall. Paint dripped to the drop cloth and the news paper.

"The rest is history, or whatever they say." She dipped the pain brush and flipped it a few times, coating it evenly. "You can piece together what kind of person I am, right? Especially up against a guy like Chris."

He was quiet for a few seconds, and then he said, "We all do what we have to."

Jill smiled. "Jesus... you guys really are one in the same."

"I wish I woulda been on that mission, you know? The one that nailed Wesker." He sounded distant, almost dreamy.

"I think that's Chris filling your head with fantasies. It wasn't anything you'd choose to live through." She stopped running the brush along the edge of the base board. She looked up at him. "If I asked you something... would you tell me the truth?"

"Yeah." He frowned.

She took her time. "Chris doesn't talk about it, you know? Wesker, or the mission. I think he's afraid it'll kill me. Sometimes, I hear stuff from his sister. And I mean, I really shouldn't be talking to anybody... but I need to. To remember who I am."

Piers nodded.

"I heard he had son."

Piers's heart stopped.

"Is that true? Did Wesker have a kid?"

He hadn't known Jill Valentine even existed until this very morning. He hadn't known that Chris had been heavily involved with her - in a federally illegal way, no less. But he did know that Chris had kept Jake Muller from her for a reason, other than the minor issue of national security. This was a couple that had endured every possible disaster together, and yet he chose to leave out one of the most important points of his war on bioterrorism.

Romero barked out front, and tires crunched the gravel driveway. _D'yer Mak'er_ blasted from a tinny stereo.

Chris was home.

Piers looked at Jill. He didn't say a word. He didn't need to. She knew.

And she nodded.

* * *

 _Piers crashed to the metal grate. He pushed, tried to get up... but he couldn't. It was so cold. The floor was just so cold. He almost couldn't feel it anymore. If he could only... lay there. For a moment. Just... lay down and sleep. Only for a moment._

 _"_ _Get up! I said get up, soldier!" A deep voice barked through his spell._

 _He struggled against Chris, shoving him. "Leave... me..."_

 _But Chris wouldn't leave him, wouldn't let him sleep; he wrenched him up by the back of his collar. The fabric of his tactical vest, his shirt, was fused with what was left of his skin. It tore - his flesh splitting open and the raw muscles of his back taking the blast of bitter, hateful air. Piers cried, agony tearing through the right side of his body again. Everything blurred and he went under for a few merciful seconds, before he was jarred back to consciousness by Chris pulling him up, slinging his human arm over his shoulders._

 _"_ _Almost there, kid... almost there. Only a little more..." Chris sounded like he was whispering. He wasn't._

 _Piers struggled to keep his legs from collapsing. His head lolled back forth between his shoulders. Every breath was a battle, every heartbeat another white-hot pang in his chest._

 _"_ _Come on, Nivans! Fight!" They turned a corner, the rush of angry water closing in behind them. Chris practically dragged Piers as he yowled with pain. He readjusted them both, his arm winding around Piers's waist. "Together," he said breathlessly, the two of them limping along. "We go together."_

 _Piers leaned on the wall, his teeth gritted, exhausted beyond the bounds of his failing body. He pushed Chris away again. "Go... go without me, dammit."_

 _Chris flew into a rage, pinning him. "You will fucking move, soldier! You will fucking move now! Under my command as your -"_

 _Piers raised his grotesque arm, the boiling and popping of the mutation the only sound between them then. Electricity sparked up and down the length of horrifying flesh. He pointed it directly at his captain - threatening. Glowering, his teeth chattering as he slipped into hypothermic shock, he said, "I swear I'll do... it... if you don't -" He winced, another jolt of blinding pain exploding in his side. He caught his breath, his nostrils flaring. "Get the fuck out of here, Chris."_

 _They glared at each other, heaving._

 _"_ _Go!" Piers kicked out at him, catching him in the shin._

 _Chris didn't budge. With the water roaring all around them, cracks splintering the glass above and below, the pressure building, certain death imminent... Chris didn't move._

 _Piers ground his teeth and wailed, looking up... looking for God, for anything, for something to pull him through or end it._

 _He stumbled, dug down farther than he ever had for the strength to keep going._

 _He would try._

 _Because Chris Redfield couldn't die here... he couldn't._

* * *

"She always like that?"

Chris continued to strip the porch railing. The scrapings fell in dark spirals to the ground. A radio played softly from the doorway, set as close to them as the cord would allow. Chris looked up and over the banister, following Piers's gaze.

Under an old tree in the side yard, Jill worked into the cat pose - on all fours, thighs spread, her back arching up dramatically. She held it for several seconds, and then let her spine cave into the cow position. Her perfectly rounded ass thrust up, chest opened and head thrown back. Not a care in the world other than finding her yogic center and feeling the mid-autumn sun on her face.

Chris watched her and then turned his attention back to Piers, his eyes narrowing. "Like what?"

Piers shifted his weight from one foot to another, crossing his arms so that he hid his bad hand. "Nothing. Just..."

"Just _what_?" He set the stripping tool down, annoyed.

"New Age, or whatever," Piers mumbled, looking away and rubbing his head.

"Oh." And the guard dog in him settled back down. "Earth mother? Nah. She, uh..." He started scratching off the weathered paint, distracted. "When we got back... all the doctors and labs and shit... She stopped going. Kept getting sicker."

Piers sipped from one of Jill's expensive bubbly waters, listening. He looked at the green glass bottle, turning it to read the label. It burned his sinus cavities. Shit in his face still wasn't right. He had to watch it.

But he almost liked the sensation. It reminded him of sneezing.

Sneezing reminded him of cumming.

He was sure that Jill came... _with_ Chris. His Captain. She probably came hard with him too.

 _How odd._

Chris Redfield had sex.

But he wasn't _currently_ having sex; he was fixing up a porch.

"She got into holistic healing. Had to. Couldn't stand the thought of another test..." He smoothed his hand over the woodgrain. Piers was quiet. Chris looked up. "You should think about it... when all the surgeries are done, I mean."

Jill slipped down into the child's pose, her back rounding, arms outstretched. She relaxed. Piers could see her sigh contentedly.

They had sex, the two of _them_. Chris and Jill.

Piers wondered whether they would while he was a guest.

 _Probably._

He might never have sex again. He cursed himself. Two years without even a handjob. _Two years_. What the hell had he been waiting for? His ex-wife? And her fucking home-wrecker professor boyfriend?

"Hey. Turn that up, would ya?"

Piers, startled, stared at Chris.

He stopped scraping. "The radio, Nivans... the _radio_. And pick your jaw up, man." Chris shook his head, smiling. " _Shit..._ "

* * *

"Piers..." She called from the kitchen. Chris held the screen door in place, the arch of his bare foot balancing it's weight while he pushed it in close to the frame. Piers glanced over his shoulder and the screwdriver he was using on the hinges slipped, nearly taking the skin off Chris's knuckles. They both cursed.

"Sorry...," Piers mumbled.

"Go on," he replied. "I'll finish it."

He found Jill crouched in front of the refrigerator, the vegetable bin pulled out and half-scrubbed on the floor beside her. She brought a yellow-gloved finger to her lips. He nodded, hands in his jean pockets.

"Please Jesus, tell me these were here when you guys came in," she whispered.

Piers, confused and frowning, leaned closer.

"Whatever... just... take 'em and dump 'em out back. Quick."

And before he could ask what she was even talking about, there was a six pack of cold Blue Ribbons in his hands.

Out back, on the little rotting deck, Piers cracked the fourth can open and poured it out into a clump of a knee-high weeds. Jill joined him, stripping her hands of the gloves, laying them over the arm of a beat-up folding chair. The reek of old beer wafted up to them. Her nose wrinkled.

"Not his?" she asked, cracking another can. It hissed and foamed. She backed up, her arm outstretched.

"I don't think so," he said. "They're pretty skunky."

"Yeah." She watched the amber liquid fall from shoulder-height to the wild grass below. "He's had this... _problem_. For a long time. On and off, I mean."

Piers looked at her. He couldn't get his chewed-down nail under the tab of the last one. After a few failed attempts, and a sore fingertip, Jill took the can from him and popped it with one of her keys.

"Do the honors?" She handed the beer back to him. He smiled weakly, just the corners of his mouth. The alcohol chugged out in great gulps until it was gone. He shook the can a bit, the last drops clinging to the leaves of a fall Phlox; it's little pink and violet flowers were lit by the last rays of the sunset.

"Mostly, he goes on those benders when there's down time... between missions. He loses his sense of purpose, I think. Sometimes...," she trailed off, her eyes glossing over at the memories. "Sometimes it's real bad, you know?"

"Yeah. I do."

She sat down slowly, easing over to the edge of the deck, her legs dangling. She rolled the can between her hands; it crinkled and crunched. "He's like... a really angry kid. I'm not sure if it's because he's an orphan... or maybe no one ever told him he needed to grow the hell up. Our very own _Peter Pan-Redfield."_ She smiled to herself. "I dunno. Other times... I'm convinced I never met anybody as put together and in charge as Chris... He's so confused. Confus _ing_." She sounded distant, when she spoke about him - like she was reliving everything.

"Is that why you... didn't marry him?" Piers sat beside her, on her right, so that she wouldn't have to see the worst parts of him. He winced and held his side until the pain subsided. Jill touched him again, her brow furrowed with concern. She ran a soft hand down the back of his neck, and then rubbed his tired shoulders in tiny, hypnotizing circles.

He couldn't look at her. She was so gentle and kind and beautiful. She shouldn't have to... _see_ someone like him.

She stroked the cowlick of hair at the nape of his neck and it took everything in him to not close his eyes and beg her never to stop. _So long... it had been so long..._

"The binges and all the tantrums were part of it, sure," she said, quietly. "But most of it was me." Her fingers stayed there, threaded in his hair, motionless. He could feel her heat, her fire, through his shirt, where her arm rested.

"You?" His voice was almost a whisper.

She hesitated. "You don't know what I've done, Piers."

He glanced at her. It was his turn to be the comforter. "Couldn't a'been -"

"You don't know what I did." Her tone changed and she took her affection away. She was firm. She shut him out. And he felt cold without her hands on him.

Piers looked down.

"I did terrible things... They, um... they tell me it was because of the drugs. The one's Wesker gave me." She balled a fist and pressed it against wood until the joints in her fingers popped. "But the really awful part is that... I wonder if it was all the drugs... or maybe..." She let the thought hang in the air and she stared up into the dusky sky.

"Hey. Hey... no. Don't say that." He _did_ look at her then; he looked her squarely in the eyes. "No."

She smiled shyly and her hand came to his face, her thumb brushing his cheek. "I've tried for years to be what he deserves... but he needs so much," she said. "Chris needs more than _I_ could ever give him."

They were quiet then. Something had been exchanged. _Something._ Piers didn't know what it was really... but there had been an understanding, or an agreement, or an acknowledgement.

A nameless _something_ passed between them - the two people who knew Chris Redfield better than he knew himself.

"We should bury these in the trash. Deep," she said, breaking the spell. She gestured to the empty cans. "He's so happy right now. I wouldn't want anything to... you know."

Piers nodded. He _did_ know. Because his own happiness was dependent on Chris's.

It scared him - that sort of manic feeling he got when Chris was pleased... or when Chris was being cruel. He absorbed it all. Piers knew he would do anything to keep him where he was right now - in that perfectly-balanced, sober contentment.

He would do _whatever_ it took.

And that scared him to death.

* * *

"No meat?"

"Nope."

"Not even bacon?" Piers couldn't wrap his head around it.

"Nothing that had a face," Jill said. She took another forkful of couscous. "Been responsible for enough deaths in my life. Came to a point where I just couldn't do it anymore. So I gave up meat."

Piers cut into the steak. The _jus_ still ran red. Chris had served it up just how he liked - rare. It nauseated some people. He worried about Jill. "Do you... do you mind if I eat this... in front of you, I mean?"

She laughed. "You always this polite?" Piers smiled, embarrassed. "Of course I don't mind. I used to love meat."

Chris joined them at the rickety kitchen table. He'd left the door to the back open, and the chilly night crept into the little house, smelling of the grill and the mountains. Chris licked his fingers and then wiped them on a paper towel. "You jerks started without me?"

Jill bared her teeth at him. He laughed. "Keep up your bullshit and I'll _finish_ without you because your ass will be eatin' on the porch," she said, and then added slyly, "Not that finishing without you is anything new..."

"Oh, it burns!" He leaned back in the chair, clutching his chest dramatically. He made a check in the air with his finger. "Put one on the board for Valentine."

"You got all of this, Piers? Do what the man says now - keep track of our headshots, alright?" Jill laughed and stabbed a piece of lettuce from her salad.

"No. No - that's not how it went, Jill. You're crazy. Really. You are." Chris crossed his arms.

"Oh yeah? How do you remember it, big boy?"

He huffed, put on the spot. His mouth hung open, halfway to a smile.

"Right. Yeah. Because that's _exactly_ how it happened," Jill balled up her napkin and tossed it triumphantly to her plate. She gave Piers a look, just to be sure he'd witnessed her victory.

"No, wait. I thought... now just _wait_." Chris held up his hands. She raised her eyebrows, nodded for him to continue. "She gave that picture to Vickers... and then he gave it to me."

Piers listened and watched, his amused gaze volleying between them as they bickered. They fit so easily; they were made for each other. He didn't feel that he was intruding; after all, they included him at every turn, brought him into every private joke, forced him to call this time and place _home_. But he couldn't help feeling that he was just a visitor with them. The air in the cabin all but hummed with their sexual tension - a playful swat to each other's asses, a look that lasted a bit too long for anyone other than lovers - and it reminded Piers that he wasn't part of anyone's sexual tension.

Maybe never again.

"Goddammit, Chris!" She laughed and slapped an open palm to the table. "She gave _you_ the picture, and Wesker pissed you off the next day, so you hid it on his desk!"

" _Me?_ No. Not little Rebecca."

"Yes, little Rebecca! Don't you remember? She was obsessed with you!" Jill was nearly yelling, her expressions so animated, Piers had to smile.

Chris shook his head. "I don't know..."

"What don't you know? Don't you... I mean, you remember what he said, right? When he found it?" She geared up for an impression of Wesker, her back rigid in the chair, hands folded in front of her. Chris was wheezing before she even started. _"What the fuck is this, Redfield? Do you think it humorous to threaten the security of my position with lude and lascivious photographs of young women on my team? Do you find this funny? Perhaps if you played slightly less and worked slightly more... Are you truly laughing right now? Is this a joke to you, Redfield?"_ Her voice was nasal and stiff - flawlessly Wesker.

Chris was clapping and trying to catch his breath as he sprawled out in his chair. He wiped his teary eyes. "Jesus... yeah. Yeah. I remember now."

They settled down and were quiet for a while. Chris sniffled, his foot rubbing his old dog's side as it snored beneath the table. "Jill... There's something I should tell you... about this guy we met... in Edonia."

Piers stood and gathered their paper plates. He left them alone to have that conversation.


End file.
